ASP.NET Secrets, Part 2

Introduction

I'm Karl Moore and in this article, we'll be exploring a bundle of further .NET tricks to really put the shine on your Web applications. Today, we'll figure out:

Three Steps to Changing Your Page Title in Code!

How to Send Mail in ASP.NET

The Secret to Uploading Files with Ease

How to Dynamically Create Images

Ready to get stuck into .NET code?

Three Steps to Changing Your Page Title in Code!

If I asked you to change the title of your Web form, you'd be forgiven for looking for a "title" or "text" property somewhere. The problem is, that mysterious property doesn't exist: Microsoft forgot to put it in. If you want to change your page title programmatically, you have to do it yourself. Here's how.

Firstly, switch to the HTML view on your Web form. Near the top of your page, you'll see the title tag, looking something like <title>WebForm1</title>. Replace this with <title runat="server" id="PageTitle"></title>. Here, you're creating a title tag that runs on the server and has an ID, meaning you can manipulate it in code.

Next, switch back to design mode; then, open up the code window behind your form. At the top of your page, under the Inherits line, add the following line of code. This declares the server title tag you've just added:

Our third and final step involves changing the page text. Behind the Load event of your page, or in response to some similar event, set the InnerText property of the PageTitle tag to your new page title. Here's my sample code:

PageTitle.InnerText = "Welcome! - Last Updated 20/05/2003"

And that's it—one line of code and your page title has changed. Hey, presto!

How to Send Mail in ASP.NET

Sending mail from a Web page is perhaps one of the most commonly requested code snippets. And to make your life easier, here's a function that encapsulates all the functionality for you. Simply call it, passing in the appropriate arguments, and you're sorted: